


Real-Life Demons: Alt. Universe

by fr1day



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Alastair is an asshole, Alternate Universe, Human Castiel, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Kidnapping, Non-Supernatural AU, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Torture, Trans Character, Trans Dean Winchester, Young Castiel, Young Dean, Young Sam, human angels
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-07
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-08 06:31:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15924827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fr1day/pseuds/fr1day
Summary: Alternate Universe: no supernatural, just some really fucked up people.





	1. Raised from Hell

**Author's Note:**

> Hey gang! This is my first supernatural fic, but i’m planning to write more in the future (most set in the canon verse), so stay tuned if you like this!

The air is hot and heavy in here, full of the debris of summer, everything coated in dust and mould. A thick film of neglect has settled, over the months- years?- that the man has lived here, and it makes Castiel’s nose twitch as he steps into the room. It must have once been nice, he muses, a sitting room, perhaps for entertaining guests, for watching television. 

There’s signs of... something, here, there’s fast-food wrappers crumpled on the floor and shattered glass- from the window, by the looks of it- crunches under Castiel’s shoes as he advances. There’s something in red droplets on the floor, standing out against the beige carpet that stretches across the first floor of the house, and he swallows.

Castiel continues to walk through the house. _This is a bad idea_ , he thinks, _a terrible idea._ If the man knew he’d been here, he didn’t know what the hell he’d do. But someone had to do this, and apparently he and his brothers were the only ones who’d seen enough to have an inkling at what the hell was going on. A bird caws from the window, and Castiel jolts despite himself. _focus._ He forced himself deeper into the house. _Find the missing kid._

The house wraps its cloying scent around him like heavy drapes, making him shiver. The downstairs area is empty. He decides to check the upstairs next; he could see from the outside that the windows are boarded up, so he doesn’t know what to expect. He’s about to make his way up the staircase when he hears a noise.

Crying. Somebody crying.

Castiel cocks his head, listening. He’s often been told to break this habit, that it makes him seem like an animal, but it helps him to concentrate. The sound is coming from underneath him, a basement, maybe, and it’s very, very quiet. Castiel dosen’t make a sound as he searches room to room for a door.

He’s almost stopped hearing any noise when he opens the door under the stairs and sees a staircase leading into darkness. Any sounds he might have heard from down below abruptly stop, and he frowns, reaching into the pocket of his blue raincoat for a flashlight. It illuminates the wooden staircase, but seems to make it creepier with the ray of yellow light.

Slowly, carefully, he descends the stairs, his flashlight beam sweeping in a low arc around his feet. There hasn’t been any more noises, but he’s found a chair that looks to have been recently sat in and an ancient television set. He feels along the wall for a lightswitch as he walks further into the basement, and he’s surprised when his fingers find purchase at one.

He flicks the light on, and the whole basement is illuminated in a watery glow.

The first thing that strikes him is how huge it is. It’s a wide, low-cielinged space with several upright beams where there must have once been walls, and by the looks of it the whole basement takes up most of the area the old man’s property covers. The second thing that strikes him is the strange, twisted symbols spray-painted in red and black on the walls, _all over_ the walls. Almost every inch of the plaster is covered in them. And the third thing that strikes him is that he’s standing less than ten feet away from the kid who’s been missing for two months.

The kid- Dean, he thinks the posters said, he hadn’t really been paying attention- is about his age, and sits on the floor with his back against the wall. His hands are held at an awkward angle to the side of him, and as he shifts a silver glimmer alerts Castiel to the fact that he’s handcuffed to one of the beams. His face is grimy, covered in dirt, tears, sweat and what looks like dried blood, and there’s a stench rising from where he sits which suggests the old man hasn’t uncuffed him recently. Castiel tried to say something, he doesn’t know the hell what, but all that comes out is,

”Holy _shit_ , are you alright?”

Dean snorts slightly, and Castiel marvels at his ability to do so, then wonders if Dean is delirious.

”What’s it look like to you? You come down to get me the hell out of here or what?”

”Yeah. Yeah, don’t worry, I’m-“

Castiel speeds over, kneeling in front of where Dean’s hands are cuffed, and pulls a knife out of the pocket of his trousers. He notes the way Dean flinches. He raises it slightly, and swings it down to clash against the handcuff chain.

“That gonna work?” Dean asks, pulling the chain taught to give Castiel a better shot.

All he says is, “Hopefully,” and goes back to slashing. The knife is one of the best his brothers’ owned, with a blade that could cut through just about anything, and judging by the rust on these handcuffs it won’t take much more to break Dean out. The knife makes scraping and clashing noises as he saws it against the chain, and both he and Dean cringe.

Castiel brings it down again, breaking one of the links, and pulls the two halves apart. He can’t get the cuffs themselves off, but Missing Kid’s free, so he figures this is good enough for them to get the hell out of here.

He eyes Dean’s shaking legs uneasily and offers a hand to help the other boy up, starting slightly when Dean takes it and it’s almost effortless to help him stand. He’s unhealthily thin. Castiel pulls Dean’s arm across his shoulder and walks briskly across the floor of the basement, half-helping, half-dragging Dean with him.

”Thanks, man,” Dean slurs, and it looks like he’s slipping in and out of consciousness, his eyes fluttering open and shut. “Hey- wuss- wussyurname, anyway?”

”Ca- Clarence,” Castiel replies, starting to help Dean up the stairs and praying that his brothers are still distracting the old man.

”Cla- Clare- Cl’rence, Sam. Where’s Sammy, I...” he groans.

Castiel looks over in horror as he realises Dean’s crying, his face crumpling, liquid pushing itself from the corners of his eyes to run down his face, mixing with the grime already dusty over his cheeks. His arm tightens around Castiel’s shoulder and he trembles, knees buckling as they ascend the last few steps up to ground level.

Something’s dripping on the hard wood floor, and Castiel looks down in trepidation of what he might see. Blood- fresh, dark blood- is dripping steadily from a gash on Dean’s thigh, and as his eyes are drawn to where the blood makes droplets at their feet he notices one of Dean’s is twisted, the ankle popped sideways in a way that makes nausea rise in his chest. He pulls the other’s arm to lean on him more, and Dean shudders at the movement, almost unconscious.

He half-shuffles, half-drags Dean through the rooms he crossed through on the way here, spurred on by the sight of the door at the far end of the house. (He entered, and he’s going to leave through, the front door; they’ve never seen the old man come in or out this way, so they assume he uses the back entrance.) As they enter the hallway, he steadies himself on the table with a grunt, feeling a furry layer of dust come away in his fingers as he lifts it again. They’re almost out. 

As he opens the front door with one hand, steadying Dean with the other, he hears a sound that makes his heart sink.

The back door opening. So his brothers haven’t managed to distract the old man for long enough after all.

Castiel’s suddenly swarmed with adrenaline, and he hikes Dean at his shoulder and shoves the front door open, hearing at the corner of his consciousness the old man’s shout as he sees them. Then he’s running accross the front yard in the dusky light, dragging Dean by the hand and shoulder, shouting _“hurry up,”_ in his ear, trying to make him run, thinking _oh God oh God oh God_ when he turns his head, still running, and sees the old man standing there pointing a gun at them.

He hears it go off, and he doesn’t look back as he pulls his charge down, both of them skidding on the pavement in front of his parked car, Dean with a cry of pain. Castiel pulls open the door, fumbling, his heart racing; he shoves Dean into the passenger seat and, half-in half-out the car, he floors the accelerator.

He hears two more shots as he drives away, swerving, pushing Dean’s head down as the car speeds over the rain-slick tarmac. He pulls the door closed with one hand, taking the other to steer, thanking God his car isn’t one of those ones that insists on you having your seatbelt buckled before it starts driving.

The car is five blocks away before he finally starts going under eighty. He looks down at the boy in the passenger seat, who’s passed out, eyes closed and breath shallow. He’s alive. They’re both alive, and he got Dean out of there.

He fishes the poster out of his jacket and shakes it out with one hand, ignoring the large print blaring ‘missing’ and instead squinting at the phone number and address printed at the bottom of the sheet. It’s smudged, but he can make it out. 

_Singer Auto Self-Service Salvage Yard, 2194 Carriage Lane._


	2. Singer Auto

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HEWWO gang..........
> 
>  
> 
> so... Chapter 2 time

The kid in the passenger seat of his car looks like absolute shit.

Castiel reaches over to pull the seatbelt accross him, slightly elbowing him upright while keeping his eyes on the road. It’s about a twenty-minute drive from here to Singer Auto, fifteen if he pushes it. Dean groans, still unconscious, but feeling the movement, and Castiel hopes that when he wakes up, he doesn’t panic. He’s seen enough injuries to know the side effects, and Dean’s look pretty bad, so there’s a good chance he was delirious for most of their escape, most likely due to an infection.

The gash on Dean’s thigh is still leaking blood, and it pools on the car seat as he shifts. One of his eyes is dark and puffy, and there’s swollen bags under both, the skin baggy from lack of sleep. Further down, his flannel shirt is in rags and the undershirt beneath, that must have once been white, is brown and gritty. The crotch of his pants is stained with dried urine- and more jarringly, blood, which makes Castiel swallow and try to think about anything but what the old man has been doing to him for these two months.

The only sound for the next two minutes is the car rumbling underneath him before a tinny ringtone echoes from one of his pockets and he jumps. One hand on the wheel, he fishes in his coat for the flip phone quickly, hoping to answer before it rouses Dean.

He keeps his eyes shut, thankfully- Castiel checks his pulse at that, just to make sure, but it’s fine- and Castiel answers the phone.

”Uriel,” he says, by way of greeting, and is returned with a cold, “ _Castiel._ ”

 _”Did you find the boy?”_ Uriel asks, his voice metallic even through the phone. Castiel sighs; Uriel is short and to the point as always.

”Yes.”

_”Good. Do you think he knows anything?”_

Castiel frowns. “Uriel, he’s in pretty bad shape. I don’t think...”

 _”We’ll question him later,”_ Uriel interrupts, and Castiel rolls his eyes, even though he knows Uriel can’t see him. _”Did you find anything at the man’s house?”_

”Yeah. His basement was painted all over with those red and black symbols. He was definitely one of them, but I don’t think he was actively working with any of them. It looked like he was the only one living there, except De- except the kid.”

 _”Okay. We can work with this,”_ Uriel says, his voice tight. _“When you get the kid back to where he lives, have them call the police. Tell them everything. Michael’l go in in his getup, see if there’s anything at the old man’s place that might help us find more of them.”_

”Okay,” says Castiel, and since there’s nothing more to report he hangs up.

”Mrbgh,” Dean grunts from the passenger seat. The phone call must have woken him up. “Who’re you callin? Bobby?”

”My brother.”

Dean seems to wake up properly, and shuffles into a proper sitting position. Castiel doesn’t miss the concealed whimper as he jolts his twisted foot, and puts a hand on his shoulder. Dean flinches away.

”Sorry, I-“

”Don’t worry about it.”

A sign from the side of the road catches his attention, and two minutes later Castiel rolls up the drive to Singer Auto, the gravel crunching under the tires. Dean’s leaning against the window, his breaths coming in hisses, and when he sees where they are it hitches.

”We’re here,” Dean says simply, and Castiel thinks he’s trying not to cry. He doesn’t say anything.

——

The rain runs rivulets down Sam’s window, casting dripping, blueish shadows on the page he’s writing on. He chews on the dead skin at his knuckle, clipping it short with his teeth and spitting the debris into his wastepaper basket. He does this far too much; this and picking at the stitches of his scar, and he often has to carry extra tissues around for when his hands start bleeding. His therapist hates it.

The few words on his page are messy and smudged, and even though he knows he’s going down in English he can’t really bring himself to care. Thwipping the pen between his fingers against the table, Sam closes the exercise book and sighs.

He starts as the light coming in through his window turns yellow, and gravel disturbed by the tires of a car reaches his ears. Must be a visitor; he didn’t hear Bobby leave. He doesn’t particularly care who it is, as long as it’s not someone who’s gonna come up to them with a simpering, pitying expression on their face and who’ll hand them a card and say, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

Sam chews at his raw bottom lip and makes to walk down the stairs. He figures he should answer the door; Bobby’s probably resting and Rufus is out getting Chinese. As he pads down the wooden stairs, rubbing his knuckle on his trousers, he hears the doorbell ring and instinctively calls out, “S’okay, Bobby, I got it,” giving him a nod as he passes the living room. (Or the ‘office’, which is what it mostly is.)

He yawns as he pulls back the chain, aware of how messy his hair is and how he probably hasn’t showered in a few days but not particularly giving a crap. As he unlocks the door, a small part of his brain registers a bad smell, like an unwashed dog, and he wrinkles his nose. “Hello?” He says, pulling open the door, and everything else melts away because he’s standing less than a foot from his brother who’s been missing for two months.

 _”Oh my God,”_ he breathes, grabbing Dean’s face in his hands, clutching his shirt, anything to prove he’s real. “Dean? _Dean?_ “

”He’s badly hurt,” says the boy next to him on the doorstep. He’s holding Dean up with an arm around his shoulder, and Sam immediately takes Dean into his own arms, still hugging him and shaking him, and, inexplicably, crying. He hasn’t cried in months. _Dean’s here, it’s Dean, it’s Dean,_ every fibre of his body screams, and he holds on tight to make sure it’s real.

”Sa... hammy. S’m,” Dean struggles. _”Sam..”_

”You’re okay, Dean. You’re home, you’re here, yoh- huh-“

Sam’s words are lost through a mess of tears and painful sobbing. He’s vaguely aware of Bobby rushing in, gasping, yelling, _“Dean,”_ but all he really registers is the warmth as wraps both of them in his arms, shaking.

He doesn’t notice the boy who was with Dean slip away, and he doesn’t hear the faint rumble of his car’s engine as he drives off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope y’all liked this, please leave a comment and as always stay classy!


	3. Pamela Barnes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Im bad at titles. Did I make pamela too OP? I just like her. #justiceforpamela. She should have been in the show more lol. Hope I did everyone justice. bye.

_Who the hell was that guy?_

The question runs through Dean’s mind as he sits on the couch inside Bobby’s living room, his brain filled with the background noise of terrible daytime TV. He shifts around to look at Sam, who’s mindlessly watching the sam show as he eats cold noodles with a fork, textbook open on the table in front of him. Sam hadn’t even seen the dude properly before he’d bolted, but Dean had a good gander at the guy, and he knew he hadn’t seen him before in his life.

So why had a guy who’d- according to most of the people he’d asked, anyway- never been seen in town before suddenly show up and pull a nobody missing kid from a crazy guy’s basement, then get the hell out of dodge?

It doesn’t make any sense, but hopefully, now that he’s stopped being questioned by police and they’re starting to leave him alone for the day, he’ll be able to get back in his groove- or Sam will, at least. Sam’s always been the studious one out of the two of them, but they’ve both got a good eye, which makes them good at knowing things, or, at least, finding things out.

Dean scratches at the bandgages on his leg, shuddering as the cut smarts. He checks his watch- 8:36 PM- then figures, what the hell. He calls over at Sam.

”You wanna go see if we can dig anything up about the guy?”

——

It’s 11:49, and they’ve still got jack and shit. The screen of Bobby’s laptop is starting to burn Dean’s eyes, and he yawns just as Sam groans in frustration as the archives professional he’s been talking to for the past hour informs him that they have no information on anyone by that name or description here, and to please hang up because they’re closing in ten minutes and his boss will get on his case if he keeps the lights on for too long.

Sam hangs up with a beep and a sigh while Dean takes another chip and crunches it between his teeth, savouring the salty flavour. The only thing he’s gotten from three hours of googling and digging around on the internet is that Clarence is probably a fake name, nobody’s ever seen him in town before and that the only person who might know who the hell he is isn’t answering her messages right now, because she’s probably asleep.

Pamela Barnes- self-proclaimed gossip, spy, possible psychic and all-round weirdo, who’s network of young people, crackheads and idiots can apparently ‘find anybody, anything, or anyone you need’- this coming from her ‘business partner’, Charlie Bradbury, and which Dean has to admit is an enticing sales pitch. She’s also described as being ‘open 24/7’, which Dean has to severely doubt after several hours of radio silence down her end.

He’s surfing for cat videos on the ancient laptop and has almost decided to call it a night when he gets the call. His phone vibrates suddenly on the table, and he jumps, grabbing it and picking up before it can buzz again.

”About freakin’ time,” he says, ignoring Sam’s patented you’re-being-an-asshole face. “This Pamela Barnes?”

”I got half a mind to hang up, after that greeting. You can call me Pam. I was finishing up with a seance.”

”A what-now?”

 _”It’s some weird voodoo crap where they contact the spirits of the undead,”_ interjects Sam with a hiss. Dean raises an eyebrow, mouthing _how do you even know that?_

”So I’m assuming you’re Dean Winchester?” Pamela asks lazily. “Heard a lot about you, big boy.”

”All good, I hope,” he counters, smirking then stopping when he realises she can’t see him and he looks like an idiot. “So- and I’m assuming you’ve read my messages- what can you do for me?”

“And a lot of them there were. Anyone ever teach you not to double-text?”

”Enough with the foreplay, what do you have on this guy?” Dean’s already fond of Pamela, and he’s known her for less than eight minutes.

”Well,” Pamela begins, and he can hear her chair creak as she leans forward, the click of a mouse beginning, “After I finished up with the seance- terrible, by the way, no spiritual activity at all- I did a little digging, and this guy’s name is _not_ Clarence. I’d’ve guessed you know that already, though-“ she says, before Dean can interrupt- “So you’ll be happy to know that thanks to some police records and a few dumb kids who weren’t afraid to spill their guts for a few bucks, I got him. The real guy. Name’s Castiel.”

 _”Castiel_?” Dean makes a face. “Seriously?”

”I can explain the weirdo name- whole family’s a bunch of religious fanatics. And you’re not going to _believe_ some of the dirt I’ve pulled up on them.”

Dean puts the phone on speaker, so Sam, who’s been making annoyed faces and half-lunges for the mobile this whole time, can hear. “Do tell.” He encourages her. Pamela begins.

”Massive family- bunch of older brothers, some adopted, I’m guessing, few sisters as well. No mom, shady on the whole dad front-“ there’s a flurry of fingers on a keyboard, and Sam’s looking at the phone like she’s a woman after his own heart, mouth open- “But one of the brothers has custody of the rest. Only.. Jesus, only twenty-six. Name’s Michael. Whole family’s named that way, apparently, after angels.

”I’ve got the other’s name’s up now- looks like they were all enrolled in Christian school for a few years- Wow, these people are nerds. This one’s a 4.5 GPA and everything-”

”What are their names?” Sam asks, on the edge of his seat. Dean can hear Pam start on the other end of the phone.

”Oh, there are two of ya now?” she asks.

”It’s cool, he’s with me. Sam. We’re brothers.”

Dean swears he hears Pamela mutter, “ _Oh cool, two for the price of one,_ ” before she goes back to unravelling Castiel’s family and probably breaking copious amounts of laws in the process. They learn that there are eleven in total- “ _That’s a lotta Christians_ ,” Dean comments, while Sam simply whistles- and that before Michael took custody, two of them ducked out on the rest.

”Okay,” Pam says, “There’s Samandriel, the youngest, about eleven, but, uh, I think he wants to want to be called Alfie- it’s scribbled everywhere on his tests and some teacher’s bitched about it on his report card.” 

_Same, kid,_ Dean thinks, drawn back to when he used to rip up reports with his birthname on them and get scarily pissed at anyone who wouldn’t use ‘Dean’. He was one rebellious kid, more ways than one.

”Keep goin’, then,” he says, noticing Pamela’s silence. She draws in a breath, and there’s more frantic clicking. “Sorry.” She sighs. “Friggin’ firewalls.

“Anyway, next two are much older, seventeen- twins, Hannah and Anna- Oh, they look way different. Thought they were gonna be identical. Uh, so, apparently Anna skipped outta Christian Academy or whatever and lived with a friends for a year- I’ve got a police report saying the school reported her missing and investigations kinda slipped until someone in her family brought her in. Hannah’s a goody two-shoes, far as I can tell. Ew, all A’s.”

Sam snorts slightly, and Dean absent-mindedly picks at the edge of the bandages on his thigh, hardly realising what he’s doing so engrossed he is in this cracking open of an entire family right in front of his eyes. “Wait.” He says suddenly, snapping his fingers. “You got anything on why he’d want to drag me outta- well, y’ve seen the news. You know it. Uh, that place?”

”Hold on, I’m gettin’ there.” Pam says (he swears she’s enjoying this). “You have no sense of drama.

”Okay, rest of the family. Next there’s Castiel himself. He’s a good boy, straight A’s and I couldn’t find anything on police records, but...” she clicks her tongue. “Most’ve his elders are in it deep. Balthazar- he’s twenty-one, Castiel’s nineteen- he’s got four Drunk and Disorderlys, _and_ some underage drinking. Alchoholism, probably. Then there’s Gabriel, twenty now. From the looks of things, he split at around seventeen. There’s been some record-wiping on here... Ooh, must be a stain on the family. That sucks.”

”Can we just get the info without the comments?” Sam sighs, but he’s grinning. Pam must hear it in his voice, because she tuts playfully. “Me without that drama? That’s a giraffe without legs, honey. Wrong and unnatural.”

“So what’s up with Michael, anyway?” Dean interjects.

”Getting to that...Uriel, twenty-one. Pretty average student... oh, one account of aggravated assault. Oh, and he got an award in highschool for football... he looks pretty ripped. Then there’s Raphael, GPA 4.5. Nursing student? Talk about living up to your name...”

Dean looks at Sam, and Sam shrugs.

”He’s the angel of healing, honey... Jesus, am I the only one with any angel knowledge around here?”

”Probably. C’mon, continue.”

“Okay, okay. Here’s Naomi... two accounts of assault on her siblings- oh, that’s rough, real rough. She’s twenty-six... hope it wasn’t the little one. Next it’s the other runner. Says his name’s ‘Lucille’.”

Sam and Dean grimace simultaneously. “Could they have picked a _more_ pansy-sounding name for this guy?” Dean asks.

Pamela whistles. “Well, his name may be pansy, but he sure ain’t. Eight accounts of assault, three D&Ds, and one GBH. That’s about when he left, probably to fly under the radar. Still an open case.”

Dean still doesn’t have answers. “So why the hell would this guy come and- well- save me, then leave for no freakin’ reason? What was he even doing here in the first place?”

“Hmm.” Pamela clicks her tongue. Then she snaps her fingers. “There’s some weird comments on Lucille’s file. Some shit about a cult- Jesus, this is getting weird- Oh. Think I get his name now.”

”Why’s he the only one not name’s after an angel, then?” Asks Dean.

”Think his dad- Charles, says here- was pre-e-etty messed up. Apparently wanted to name him ‘Lucifer’. Lost a court case against the state for that one, then...” she sucks in her teeth. “‘Parently Luce was abused. He’s been diagnosed with anti-social personality disorder, some psychoticism... the works. Oh, and he’s apparently a cult leader.”

”He’s a _what_?” Both Winchesters chime in unison.

”Damn, I got chills when you did that.”

”Uh, you said _cult leader_?”

”Yup. Police searched the house when he split, found his journals... He had some friends in bad places. Used aliases- Alastair, Abbadon, Lilith-“

Dean’s head snaps up straight from where it was starting to rest on his hand. “Did- did you say _Alastair_?”

”You recognise the name?”

“No way. No fucking way he-“

”What?” Sam asks, voice laced with the urgency that came with seeing fear in his brother’s eyes and infirmity in his demeanour. “ _What?_ ”

”That’s the guy. Freaking Alistair.”

'What _guy_?" Sam persists, frustrated.

"The old man. His name was Alastair."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JDJFHDGJKHJKFHD IM SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG SCHOOL IS A BITCH HOPE YOU LIKE IT

**Author's Note:**

> Hello gang! Hope you like this supernatural au fanfiction, hopingly I’ll update soon but in the meanwhile tell me what you thought in the comments!


End file.
